Current Events Summaries - Mr. Harvey's Science Class

Friday, December 14, 2007

recentley archoloygists have discovered that polynesians where sailing the seas to south America they know this because they found chicken bones in south america that dna was related to polyneaina chickens

Larry Rudnick looked up @ outer space and he didnt see anything!!!! lol "I came home sat at the dinner table and told my hot wife we found something interesting today!!!! He discovered a void! just empty space spanning a billion light-years away. HAVE A NICE DAY!!!

In this article it tells you about the new aircraft that is able to fly around the world at 5000 miles per hour in 5 hours while following the equator. it is powered by its scramjet engines, this unmanned X-43A flew at a record speed for an air-breathing jet plane. the experimental plane is only 12 feet long. the first hypersonic flight lasted 11 seconds while its booster rockets carried it to an altitude of about 100000 feet for its test flight.

To scientists the deep sea is like Wonderland to Alice. The only way to understand the deep sea, many scientists think is to look through the eyes of a creature that lives there.Creatures that live in the deep sea have a bluish glow.(bioluminescenc.) Scientists recently made a expedition to the Bahamas to see how the animals see that far down.The oceans are thousands of feet deep in some spots.They have to make the submarine silent or else it might scare away the animals there.Bioluminescent creatures make there own light by using chemicals.Its hard to know what it really is because scientists can't spend much time down there.Scientists know that most of the creatures can only see blue light.Scientists have learned a lot about what the animals see and dont see.They want to know what bioluminescense is used for,how often they use it,and what still needs to be discovered. http://www.sciencenewsforkids.com/articles/20071212/Feature1.asp

Drinking sugar gives you energy right so shouldn't It be able to power the things in our pocket. That's right folks it should be able to power: cell phones, ipods, iphone, cameras all the digital equipment in the world. Yeah someday it will power that scientist are3 trying to find a way but wouldn't that be sweet . That will fuel the world for thousands of years and maybe even help global warming. All those enzymes going into your body will be going straight into your mom no offense but they will and your phones. We are amazing for more info call 406-sugar-power!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A man with severe brain damage regained ability to talk, eat, and move after the doctors implanted an electrical device inside his brain. He suffered a brain injury 6 years ago. He barely even responded to the world around him. The operation took 10 hours. Dr. Rezai put two electrodes in the center of the brain. They looked like a walnut. "We're essentially jump-starting the brain", Rezia said. Immediately after surgery the man opened his eyes and began responding to voices. The man remains severely disabled. His muscles are weak from disuse. He is now better than he was.

It makes sense for wolves to hunt in packs. Hunting takes up a lot of energy. Most wolves hunt in packs of four or more. Just two wolves alone cant eat a whole moose by themselves. A pair of wolves loses an average of 37 percent of their carcass to ravens. A pack of six wolves loses about 17 percent. A pack of six wolves gobbles meat quickly. Red riding hood was lucky not to get eaten by the wolf. JUSTIN, RICHIE, AND TYLER

After reading the passage about the "Nice Chimps", we have concluded that chimpanzees are naturally generous. To start, researchers in Germany created three rounds of experiments to test the level of generosity of chimps and children. ( How could they tell them apart?!) First, the scientists tried to reach a stick, close to the chimp, and waited for a response from the animals. The response was surprising to see that they helped the scientist with his task. After a duplicate of the experiment, with the children, their results came back the same. Next, they raised the bar by building some sort of an obstacle course for the chimps to complete to reach a pencil for the scientist. As time went by, they received the same info as last time and proceeded in the children. In participation of another chimp, the animals went through a third set of experiments in testing their willingness to be helpful. Surprisingly, whatever happened with the teamwork, none of the chimps rewarded other chimps with bananas. (Imagine that!) As a result to the many tests, chimpanzees and children under the age of 18 months go out of their way to help others.

Scientists at Kyoto University in Japan performed an expirement to see whether or not a chipanzee or a human can memorize numbers on a computer screen. In the first trial, the numbers flashed on the sreen for 650 milliseconds and were quickly replaced by small white squares. Then the participant had to press on the numbers in which they thought the order was correct. This sequence repeated several times. After the first trial, both human and chimpanzee scored about 80%. Then a second trial was conducted, only the numbers flashed on the screen for 210 milliseconds. Human participants only scored a 40%, while the chimpanzee scored an 80% once again. More trials were performed on younger participants, all scoring better than their elders.by John and Josh

This artical tells you that caffeine is hard to aviod. Scientist did an experiment and the kids that drank more caffeine woke up more and got less sleep than tose who didn't. The kids that didn't have that much caffeine they got lots of sleep and didn't have a crash after the drinks. caffeine is a bad thing because it raises your blood pressure. Most people that work in the morning go and get some caffeine to keep them up and so they don't fall asleep on the job. people say that kids do better on test after they have caffeine. And that shows that they are probably are already addicted to the chemical. Studies show that people without caffiene run for about 32 minutes and with it they run about 7 to 10 minutes longer than before. Caffeine is shown to harm people that are over weight because it interfears with the bodies abilities to process sugars and that leads to type two diabetes. Kids that are smaller than adults tend to feel the affect of the chemical more than adults do because it get through they're bodies faster.

In this artical it tells you why you look under you bed, why your habbits cange when your scared\freeaked\upset\nerve-racked. Haven't you ever wonderd why you look under your bed after you watch a scary movie? Fear changes your habbits, sences, and the way you think. It keeps you alive. in this artical you will learn why it happens, and what the effects can be. Costarican Red Eye Tree Frogs for example can hatch up to 2 days early if the eggs sence that a preditor (snake) is going to attack, and if hey go into the water a full 2 days ealy, they are more likley to be eaten by whaever is in that water. Read the article, i tells you aot about why you do somethings when your scared and gives you a few examples. ^-^http://www.sciencenewsforkids.com/articles/20071031/Feature1.asp By: Sam & Franchesca<33

During adolesence Tyranosuares Rex and it's relatives sometimes doubled their weight in just 4 years, according to the new study. Adult T Rex Could weigh more than 5,000 kilograms. The species of T rex lived in North America between 65 and 68 million years. On average, a T rex grows 2 kilograms every day till it's eighteen. Scientists suggest that a T rex would be to big to run for his food, it would have to scavenge. The youngsters, although, could scurry around to catch prey. By: Calvin and Karl

In less that 24 hours late last month, the ball of ice, rock, and dust, named Comet17P/Holmes suddenly grew 400,000 times brighter than normal. Three weeks after the flare up, people could still see the object without telescopes. Scientists were puzzled over the event. As the comets get closer to the sun, the star's heat vaporizes ice on their surfaces. The process releases fine dust, which reflects light. As a result, the heated comets look extrabright. To explain the rapid brightening, scientists speculate that a layer of material lifted off the comet and disintegrated. The resulting halo of dust around the objest would have reflected lots of light. It's possible that the entire comet may be made up of similarly fragile layers stacked one atop of another and glued together by ice. Some scientists think that earlier event and the modern one are related. It's possible that dust from the first event fell back onto Holmes. That could have dimmed the comet for more than a century. Last month, internal pressure may have finally become strong enough to enject the debris.

Americans chew about 1.8 pounds of gum each year. Scientists are starting to do reasearch on the benifits of chew gum. Some schools ban chewing gum but after the reascher on it they might change their mind. Scientists have found that chewing gum while taking a test can improve your test score by 25%. An ingredinent in some gums called xylitol helps decreases the risk of cavitys,heart disease, diabetes, and other serious diseases. Company's are starting to put medicine into gumballs to help kid take their medicine in a fun way. Also they are putting vitamins and minerials in them. To help the soliders stay alret durring long night they have developed a gum called "stay alert" which contains about the same amount of caffeine as a cup of coffee this gum is only avalible to the soliders right now but might be realesed to the public later. Dietitians say chew gum but dont chew to much.

the hyper x is recently broke the air-breathing jet planes flying at hypersonic speed. It has a top speed of seven times the speed of sound. that is about 5,000 miles per hour. You could fly along the equator in 5 HOURS!!! it is powered by 2 scramjet engines this plane is ONLY 21 FEET LONG. The hyper x does not even kneed a pilot. Thats right it is a unmanned experimental plane.It uses a special jet engine. It is called a scramjet. it can go as fast as a rocket but doesn't cary its own oxygen, it gets it from the air. For an engine to burn fuel and produce energy, it needs oxygen. A jet engine, like those on passenger airplanes, gets oxygen from the air. A rocket engine typically goes fast but has to carry its own supply of oxygen. A scramjet's special design allows it to extract oxygen from the air that flows through the engine. and it does so without letting the fast-moving air put out the combustions flames. However, a scramjet engine works properly only at speeds greater than five times the speed of sound.

Small shrimp have been discovered in the Great Lakes. They are called mysid shrimp. They are eating microscopic organisms that young fish eat. So they are not thiving like they used to. The shrimp are a european species that were brougt in by ships dumping their ballast water. New guidelines say that they must flush their tanks with salt water to kill any freshwater species that may be hitching a ride. There is an estimated 17 european species in the Great Lakes. No one knows how these little creatues will ultimately effect the ecosystem.

lots of people drive their cars but traveling anywhere at anytime in a car or truck comes at a price. it not just the cost of gas and insurance and repairs. cars are a major source of pollution. when the engine burns gas which releases carbon dioxide into the air along with other particles an pollutants. to help counter gas pries and reduce air pollution the environmentally friendly green cars already on the streets use a mixture of gas and electricity. when the car stops the gas engine stops then the electrics engine motor powers on. the car runs on hydrogen powered fuel cells and the only waste product is water.

When a pika is used to it's climate, ecologists took some and put them in cages and put them in colder places and they died because even in shadows they can die because of there habit. The trees also with global warming are growing smaller.

Science has came up with a one of a kind four legged robot that can teach itself, to walk and learn how to walk a different way of walking.This robot can is like a bear computer with four legs it can calculate how to move the easiest without using the damaged leg or legs.This new robot can have a possible combos of 100000 different ways.

By Nick Justin and Waynehttp://www.sciencenewsforkids.com/articles/20061129/Note22.asp